This is an Emergency Exit by Nailah Smith

Photo by Mahdi Mahmoodi on Unsplash

​“You can’t go through there,” Jason shouts across the rooftop pool.

The girl, who’d been blissfully unaware of the rule she was breaking, quickly removes her hands from the door, revealing the words “Emergency Exit. Alarm Will Sound.” The door snaps shut with a metallic click.

“Oh, I am so sorry! I thought this was the way back inside.”

Jason nods his head, flashing her his charming grin. “Other set of doors, sweetie. That one’s the emergency staircase.”

She blushes and nods back shyly before maneuvering around the pool.

I lift my glass to my lips. “There wasn’t an alarm.”

​Jason turns his head towards me but doesn’t take his eyes off the girl. “What?”

“The alarm. It didn’t go off.”

He finally blinks out of his flirtatious stupor and glares at me. “Anika, what the hell are you talking about?”

I take another sip, this one burning down my throat. “Nothing.”

“Yeah, you’re always doing that. Talking about nothing.”

I look away from him. My vision blurs, and the dozen or so people in the pool become nothing more than colorful blobs. Girls’ giggles sound shrill in my ears, men’s voices too deep and grating. I notice another couple, like us, is standing by the railing. The man leans in close to the woman. She smiles like she means it.

“You want a beer?” Jason asks.

“No.”

“What, so you’re only gonna have water?”

I swirl the liquid in my glass. “I don’t like beer.” He knows this.

“Well, you could at least try something else.”

“I told you I didn’t want to come here.” I start to walk away.

“Oh right, Anika, because everything’s about you, huh? You can’t do a single—” Jason grips my arm tight and pulls me back to him as one of his friends approaches us. He leans in close, lips grazing my ear. “Act right for once. Can you do that?” he says through gritted teeth.

I do not hear anything Jason or the friend say. I do not look at Jason’s blindingly white smile, pay no mind to the fingers tightening around my bicep. Whenever a fingernail digs into my skin, I know to smile, know to laugh, know to nod. I am here but I am not. I am looking past the friend’s head, at how beautiful the sky looks at this time of day. The sun is low and dyes the clouds pink, purple, orange. Orange is my favorite color. I am wearing green, Jason’s favorite.
​
“Anika,” Jason snaps, and I come back.

The friend smiles apologetically. “I was just asking if you’re enjoying the party.”

I smile. I will have a bruise on my arm when I get home tonight. “Of course.”

“‘Of course?’” Jason hisses when the friend has walked away. “Not even an idiot would’ve believed that.”

I lean back against the railing. The metal is cool against the skin of my back. I look over my shoulder at a bird perched on the railing further down from us.

“Are you even listening to me?”

The bird dives for the street below. “Do you ever wish—”

“Wish what? Wish my girlfriend wasn’t such a buzzkill?” He laughs, loud, but he makes it sound so genuine. He throws his head back, smiling so wide, anyone would think I’d just told him the funniest joke. “Yeah, all the time, Anika. All the damn time.”

I close my eyes. The sun is warm on my face. “Jason, I want to leave.”

“Of course you do. You always want to leave. And what if you did? If you just got up and left my best friend’s party? How would that look?”

I hardly notice the rest of what he says. All I can hear is What if you did? What if you did? A gong clanging in my head.
​
Jason leans against the railing beside me. He jerks his chin out at a girl in the water, the same one who’d opened the wrong door. She smiles and waves to him. He grins back, and he says to me, “I give you everything, Anika. I do everything for you. What more could you want?”

The metal no longer feels cold against my back. I lean into it, looking up into the sky. The clouds are all orange, all orange, all mine. There are no sirens, no alarms going off in my head, when I make the decision: I am going to leave him.

“Anika!” he screams when I am already falling.

---

Nailah Jonquil is a second-year graduate student at Columbia University School of the Arts studying to receive her MFA in fiction writing. She received her bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering/computer science and creative writing from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Originally from Detroit, MI, she was raised in Lithia Springs, GA and currently lives in NYC. Her goal is to write stories and novels that allow people to feel seen and understood.